


OnStar

by Annie17851



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt Impala, Hurt Sam Winchester, M/M, pre-destiel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-22
Updated: 2015-08-22
Packaged: 2018-04-16 15:57:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4631283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annie17851/pseuds/Annie17851
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cas is at half-power, Crowley is dead and the Darkness is raging across Kansas.  A bad time for an accident.</p>
            </blockquote>





	OnStar

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little something that popped into my head while I was driving. Set sometime in season 11.

OnStar

 

Sam Winchester slowly came back to himself and the first thing he felt was the crushing weight on his thighs. His brain was foggy and his world was sort of – leaning to the right. The side of his face was pressed lightly against a cold, hard surface, and his sluggishly clearing mind registered it as ‘window.’ Darkness surrounded him. Not the Darkness, although that could manifest pretty much anywhere, anytime these days. It was just regular, nighttime darkness. It was a little chilly in the car, too.

Oh, yeah. The car. He was in the car. His muddled brain was recalling grinding metal noises. They had hit something with the Impala. Sam didn’t know what, but he dimly remembered slamming into something. 

He whipped his head over to look for Dean, gasping at the sharp pain in his neck as he moved too quickly. 

Dean was out cold, head and chest leaning on the steering wheel and panic twisted Sam’s insides. Crazily, ‘need seat belts’ was running through his head. 

“Dean!” No reply.

Sam spared a glance out through the haphazardly cracked windshield to see a wall of trees, a couple of them spliced right into the front of the Impala. In the back of his mind Sam processed – trees, leaning car, side of a hill. They hit something, ran off the road and down a hill. Dizziness suddenly swept over him, so he barely got the second “Dean!” out and had to lean his head back and close his eyes tightly to keep from throwing up. 

Okay. Nausea passed and Sam tried to lean closer to his brother to try to wake him. To feel for a pulse. He couldn’t lean very far, but at least he could reach across and touch Dean, search for the weak pulse he was relieved to find in that spot on Dean’s throat. 

Sam’s side of the Impala had sustained the worst of the damage, and the dashboard had been pushed in and was now resting solidly on Sam’s thighs, effectively trapping him. 

Sam took one deep breath and wedged the fingers of both hands between his thighs and the collapsed dashboard, wincing tightly at the slippery feel of blood. He tried to lift the weight off himself and oh, that was so impressively painful. 

If he could wake Dean. If Dean could be okay.

Sam gave up on the dashboard and reached over with his left arm, bracing it against Dean’s shoulder and slowly straining to carefully push Dean away from the steering wheel, all the while thinking it was probably a bad idea. But, Dean’s cell phone was in his shirt pocket, hopefully working, while Sam’s was currently unreachable in his jeans pocket. 

(Insanely, the thought ran through Sam’s mind that stepping into the automotive 21st century with seatbelts and an OnStar account might just be a swell idea.)

He managed to get Dean back against the seat, dismayed at the newly-revealed wash of blood on the driver’s side window. So, head gash, bleeding profusely and hopefully slowing down soon. Sam’s arm was already aching, must have injured that as well, so he had to grit his teeth against pain as he felt for Dean’s front pocket, relieved to find the bulge of the phone, grappling it out and then letting his arm fall limply to the seat to rest. Wasted a few precious seconds, watching Dean’s chest rise and fall shallowly, hearing something like a gurgling wheeze, faint but definitely there, as his brother exhaled. 

Looked down at the numbers on the phone through tear-blurred eyes and dialed 911. Busy. Dialed it again. Busy. Eight more times and still busy. 

Of course. Of course all the emergency units would be busy dealing with the fall-out from the Darkness that was currently ravaging all the towns around them. They had been headed out to one of them to see if anything could be done when they ended up here. 

So. Castiel then, selecting #1 on Dean’s favorites list. Sam used to be #1, but these days Dean rarely had to call Sam, as they hadn’t been apart at all since they had cured Dean of the Mark. And brought this evil that was chewing up the world. 

 

Castiel had just left Hill City, chasing a bad lead, when the cell phone rang on the seat beside him. He fumbled for it, not wanting to take his eyes off the road, and answered it right away when he saw Dean’s name on the caller ID. 

“Hello, Dean!”

“Cas, it’s Sam,” and Cas’ heart dropped solidly with dread.

“Where’s Dean? What’s happened?” the angel demanded. 

“Dean’s right here beside me. He’s unconscious. We had an accident, Cas. A bad one. We need help.” 

“Is he….”

“He’s alive,” Sam interrupted. “He’s unconscious and I think he might have crushed ribs. Or internal bleeding. Or both. Maybe. Also, he’s bleeding on the side of his head and I can’t see where it’s coming from. I can’t get out. We slammed into some trees and the dashboard has me pinned. We need you now, Cas!”

“Where are you?”

“Out on 140, almost to Carneiro. The towns- they’re getting torn apart all around us. We wanted to help. We hit something…..”

“It’s too far,” Cas said quietly.

“Wait – what?” Sam asked. “What do you mean?”

“I do have my own Grace back, Sam, but it’s too weak. I just pulled out of Hill City and I am an hour and a half away from the bunker. I could fly to you, but then I wouldn’t have enough Grace left to heal either one of you. I can do one or the other. Not both.”

“Shit, Cas,” Sam breathed, studying Dean even more carefully now, reaching out again to check his pulse. Thready. Not good. 

“I know,” Cas replied, right foot involuntarily pushing down harder on the gas pedal, the Continental gathering speed in response. 

“An hour and a half,” Sam repeated dubiously. “I don’t know, Cas….”

“It won’t take me that long. If the towns are being attacked, I don’t have to worry about speed traps. (Just detours, he thought worriedly.) I’ll be there as fast as I can.”

Sam hesitated then. “Could you – I don’t know. Call someone else? Hannah?”

“I have been trying. We need to know anything I can find out about the Darkness. No one is answering and I fear for Heaven’s safety.” 

Sam gripped the phone tighter. There went that idea. 

“Okay, Cas. Just hurry. I’ll keep trying to call 911. Or I’ll go through the phone and see if any of Dean’s contacts, maybe other hunters – might be close to us.

“Try to take care of Dean and yourself,” Cas told him. “I’m hurrying.” 

There was no getting through to 911. Of the contacts in Dean’s phone- Garth, Jody, Claire, Chrissy – no one would have been closer than Castiel. 

Sam reached across to push at Dean’s shoulder again. The elder Winchester was still wheezing and gurgling, blood from his head was dripping off his jaw, black in the dark of the car. His skin felt clammy and Sam tried to use the flashlight app on the phone to gauge the color of his skin. In that light, Dean looked dead, so Sam stopped doing that in a hurry. 

“Dean! Wake up! Dean! Come on!” Sam tried a few more times, with no response. 

Sam’s legs were getting numb, and that worried him a lot more than the pain or the blood had. 

He was feeling a bit woozy again. He tried 911. No go. Then a horrible thought occurred to him and he checked the battery life on the phone. 60%. That should last an hour and a half. Might not even have to last that long, if Castiel could make that old car move. Sam knew without a doubt that Cas would be pushing the Continental to its’ limits to get to them. To get to Dean. Sam had no illusions about where he ranked on the angel’s priority line-up. 

Fuck it. Castiel knew just about where they were and he would be able to find them even if the battery died and he couldn’t talk anymore. Plus, Sam was either hearing or imagining things out there in the woods around the car. It was starting to freak him out. 

He caught movement out of the corner of his eye and jumped a bit. Nothing there. 

Great hunter you are, he berated himself. But he couldn’t get the creeping fear out of his head that the Darkness was coming down 140 Road and would be slithering up over the trunk of the wrecked Impala to consume them. 

So, fuck it. Sam called Cas again.

“What’s happening?” Cas asked as soon as he answered.

“Nothing new,” Sam explained. “Where are you?”

“North 183. It’s only been 20 minutes. I’m going as fast as I can- 90 actually, and I’m not sure I can get the old girl to go any faster. I’ll probably get to you in a half hour or so, barring difficulties. How are you doing? What about Dean?”

“My legs are numb now. I don’t know if I’m still bleeding. Dean is – his breathing sounds terrible. I still can’t wake him up and I don’t think I’m going to try again. At least right now he’s not in pain. Anything helpful is in the trunk anyway and I can’t get to it. I think I’m going to sleep now Cas, till you get here.”

“Sam, no!” Castiel shouted into the phone, pushing even harder on the accelerator, trying to get even more speed out of his car. The speedometer edged toward 95, and Castiel put the phone on speaker and laid it back on the seat so he could keep both hands on the wheel as he barreled down the dark, eerily deserted, highway.

Castiel had seen a few towns near exits as he flew by them. Several of the towns had been half dark, power outages, Cas assumed, and some of the towns had been on fire. The world was being destroyed, little by little, and no one seemed to know how to stop it. 

“You need to say awake, Sam!” Cas insisted. “I need to know you’re still conscious. I need to know if Dean – I’ll know if Dean - you need to stay awake and keep me updated. I’m coming as fast as I can!” he reassured Sam. 

“Then you need to talk to me, Cas,” Sam pleaded. “Or I’m just going to go black. If anything comes….”

“Nothing is getting to you before I do,” Cas half-prayed. “What do you want to talk about, Sam?”

“You and Dean. In the bunker,” Sam began hesitantly. “Dean told me what happened that day. He….”

“Wasn’t himself,” Cas interrupted firmly.

“But I know he feels so bad about it. I know he doesn’t even know what to say. You know Dean. He can’t. But I know Dean, too. Did you really say you would watch him murder the world? You wouldn’t stop him?” 

Castiel sighed. “I would not be able to hurt Dean. Even is he’s – not Dean. I don’t want to talk about this, Sam.”

“Okay,” Sam agreed quietly. “But someday you’ll have to talk about it or something. Tell me a story. I’m losing it, Cas.” 

Sam reached over again to prod Dean’s shoulder wearily. Still no response. For a second or two, Sam thought Dean wasn’t breathing and his heart just about stopped in his chest. Then Dean gasped and inhaled again, eyes rolling under his closed lids. 

“Sam,” Cas prompted, uneasy with the sudden silence on the other end of the conversation. 

“I’m here. I thought, it looked like Dean, but he’s breathing.”

“I would know if he stopped,” Cas stated frankly.

“Profound bond,” Sam mumbled. 

“Sam!” Cas shouted again. “What kind of stories?” 

Sam shook himself back to awareness. What? Oh, yeah. Stories. Have to stay awake. Watch Dean. “Angel stories,” Sam replied. “Like, what did you do before you got assigned to be the Winchester watch dog?”

Cas smirked a little at that, slowing down just a bit to take the exit ramp for 36 West. Definitely making good time now. 

“Well,” he began, when he was back up to speed. “I did get to go and tell the shepherds when my half-brother was born. I visited the manger as well. Babies are such tiny, beautiful things. My entire existence has not consisted of smiting, you know.” 

“But, you did your share of it, right?” Sam asked.

“More than my share, I’m afraid.” Castiel informed him. “More than I’ve liked to admit. Sodom and Gomorrah, for instance.”

“No shit?” Sam remarked wearily. “How bad was it?”

“Stay awake, Sam” Castiel reminded him. “Ancient Rome had nothing on Sodom and Gomorrah. I was still reluctant to do it. There were thousands of people there. It was the same in Egypt, with the first-born sons.” 

“Moses? Did you know him?”

“I did. We even broke bread and drank wine together once or twice. Egypt was the first of my rebellions. At least the first I remember. According to Naomi, I have always been a little - off.”

“Naomi was a bitch!” Sam declared.

Castiel silently agreed, memories of murdering a thousand Deans creeping into his mind depressingly. “How’s Dean?” he asked, trying to change the subject. 

“The same. Clammy. Breathing is bad. My legs are still numb and I’m really cold. Can’t stop shivering.”

“I’ll be there soon.” 

“When you rebel, what do they do to you? Was Anna right when she said it’s terrible?”

“More than you can imagine. If the rebellion is serious enough, an angel’s wings are ripped right out of his back. I have seen it happen once and I don’t wish to ever see it again. It is much worse than simply losing Grace and falling.” 

“Where are you, Cas?”

“Almost to Lebanon. Soon. I’ll be there soon, Sam.”

“You rebelled and fell,” Sam pointed out, and Cas could hear the shiver in his voice, tried to go even faster on the dark road. He was coming into the area around Lebanon and there were fires everywhere. He knew he would find 140 Road soon. Most of an hour had passed already. 

“I’m almost there, Sam. Hold on!”

“You rebelled and fell,” Sam repeated weakly. “For Dean. It was for Dean. I tried to tell him. He wouldn’t…..” Sam’s voice drifted off and Cas shouted frantically at the phone again.

“Sam! Wake up! Sam Winchester!”

 

For a few seconds Castiel almost decided to pull the Continental over and just fly to Sam and Dean, as he was a lot closer now, but with the warding he himself had carved on their ribs, it would take longer to search 140 Road if he was walking. He was turning onto 140 Road now. As he got closer to Carneiro, Castiel began to slow down a bit, watching for broken guide rails or any evidence of whatever the Impala had struck. He found both in the form of a huge buck, dead on the side of the road, and an Impala-sized section of guide rail twisted right off its’ foundations. 

He pulled the big car into a rock-throwing stop on the side of the road and hurried over to the guide rails. Yes, big hill, lots of trees and an Impala buried nose-first.

Just as Castiel was about to start the climb down to the car, he caught a hint of sound, somewhere behind him, coming from the direction of Lebanon. Squinting back along the highway, he saw- nothing. A big black area of nothing. But the nothing was emitting a soft, sort of rolling noise and the angel knew he had to hurry. 

Castiel scrambled down to the car, stopping his quick descent painfully by running right into the trunk of the Impala, shouting Sam’s name all the way. He went around to the driver’s side first, yanking the door open and taking in the situation inside quickly. Both Winchesters were unconscious now, and the Darkness was almost upon them. Cas reached way over to Sam, put two fingers on his forehead, two fingers on Dean’s with his other hand, and flew. Hopefully, the bunker was still intact and he had enough power to get all three of them there. 

Still unconscious, Sam and Dean landed roughly on the library floor. Castiel, now weakened, landed between them. Still gasping from exertion, he reached out to either side, a hand on each of the brothers, and sent out as much healing Grace as he could. 

Castiel’s world went black. 

Castiel’s world lightened slowly, and he would have opened his eyes, had he not felt so absolutely drained. But then memories started to slowly roll in and he bolted upright frantically. 

“Dean!” he cried. “Sam!” 

“Right here, Cas!” came the welcome reply, and Cas found Dean standing behind the couch where Cas had been sleeping, holding a mug of coffee and looking none the worse for wear. 

“Sam?” the angel asked worriedly. 

“He’s fine, Cas. We both are, thanks to you. Sam says you’re our own private OnStar. He went out for a bit to assess the damage to the town. Should be back any minute. If the roads are passable later, we can take one of the cars from the garage and go get the Continental. Have to get Baby towed, I guess. Do you want coffee?” 

Cas shook his head. “Not now. Are you really all right? I couldn’t be there sooner. My Grace is nowhere near the strength it should be, it takes some time to get back to full power, and with being cut off from Heaven right now….” 

“I don’t want to hear this from you, Cas.” Dean said, coming around to sit on the other end of the couch. “You went above and beyond getting to us and fixing us. You don’t have a single thing to apologize for.”

Dean went silent and looked away awkwardly. “On the other hand,” he went on then, not looking at Castiel, but down into his coffee mug. “My touchy-feely baby brother says I do. So, yeah, there’s that. You know, right, Cas?”

Dean finally turned his head to look at Cas hopefully.

“Yes, Dean. I know.”

Dean clapped one hand onto his own knee. “There. Glad that’s all settled. Coffee now?”

Sam came through the doorway just in time to see his big, older anyway, brother guiding a still-weak angel to the kitchen, one hand gripping Castiel’s upper arm protectively.

Sam considered that a step in the right direction and smiled.


End file.
